Running a startup isn’t easy on anyone. The glorious trails of successful entrepreneurs are littered with the scars of broken relationships and bitter resentment of cold dinners and missed birthday parties. It takes a special kind of relationship to weather the storms of startup life. At Darling Harbour, Sydney. It takes a special kind of kid too. A kid who will understand that daddy or mummy... 

What to do about (drum roll) sexting? Approaching the topic of sexting in a way that best meets a receptive outcome from your teenager is paramount. And grabbing their mobile phone to go through every message is not generally going to get a positive response. Unless… Did you originally say to your teen “Hey, I’m gonna go through your phone occasionally to check up on you?”... 

A goal is a dream until you make a plan. And the plan needs to be strategic otherwise it won’t work. A strategy is a direction – a way of heading. This is not something that already has the tactics in place. Think of a chess strategy, or war strategy – these don’t have any step-by-step procedures in place that if a single thing goes wrong the whole strategy falls apart. That... 

What’s your vision? Recently there have been discussions over ‘how long is too long’ from developers a little less than happy being part of a startup that is not yet paying them ‘what they’re worth’ or even getting involved in a startup that doesn’t pay them from the outset. Startup widows are also holding their spouses accountable for not having ‘made... 

Yesterday we went along to the World Championships. Of course, if we didn’t live half an hour from the venue, I doubt we’d have gone along. That said, all four of my kids have had fun cup stacking. It’s a bit addictive. I even enjoy it. It’s great for working on hand-eye coordination, fine motor skills, teamwork… all that good stuff. Please note *our* focus is not on... 

By now even your grandma knows about the race to a million. Ashton Kutcher, old-media celebrity turned digital insider with various multimedia projects and Twitter groover challenged CNN to a race to a million followers on Twitter. And after a nice little campaign, last night he won. It was really fun to see the video of him crossing the victory line. He was really, truly excited. That’s impressive. What’s... 

Creating a brand LoveMark in the 21st century has never been easier. Yet, the concept seems to be alien to so many companies. Many brands think they’ve got a loyal following. But what they really have is passive brand loyalty. People who buy the product all the time, but don’t really have a loving, committed relationship. It’s a marriage of convenience. Your brand is not a LoveMark.... 

I never dreamed I’d live anywhere other than Sydney, Australia. When you’ve got a good job, a house you’re constantly doing ‘something’ to, kids, dogs, routine… the last thing you think of is moving. Anywhere. Least of all to a country you’ve never been to before. But then I came home from work one day and Jed told me his start-up dreams weren’t done... 

It’s unfortunate to see the response to the closure of newspapers around the USA. There are myriad closures, staff retrenchments and newsroom faces full of sorrow. The half-hearted, ineffective attempts by print organizations to move online have not achieved the goals. As Clay Shirky says, they weren’t humble enough to believe they would really be ‘threatened’ by a new format.... 

In Australia I spent a heck of a lot of money on educating my four fantastic children. It won’t surprise many that as an educator, and someone who got her post-secondary education ‘the freaking toughest way you’d ever decide to’, education is my priority. It’s what I do. It’s really my life. As a full-time teacher at Granville TAFE, my favourite times have been... 

I do wish people would stop analysing the ‘death of print’ and focus on the future of journalism. There are so many traditional media with stories like the nicely titled “Is democracy written in disappearing ink” which attempt to say journalism will die along with the traditional formats. While I like the title, the answer if obviously “only if you guys want it to!” Suck... 

I joined Twitter on my first trip to the US, in 2007 at the Web 2.0 conference in San Francisco. And I remember thinking it sucked. I had no connections other than the conference channel – which was tweeting  basically nothing. That sucked. Segway (does it have a ue?): I’m a tertiary level teacher of marketing and journalism in Oz, and every Christmas break (5 weeks long) I commit myself... 

Taking the family out can be tough when the economy is having a downturn and there’s more month than money. That’s why I’m really excited to give you the chance to win a great prize in my blog’s very first competition! And if you don’t win, I have a code which will give you the opportunity to buy your family of four or more tickets for just $11 each! If you live in Colorado,... 

I’m a grad research student focusing on social media for my final thesis. So it’s time for me to move on from boobs to my next adventure. (I know, I know… we loved the boobs.) Anyway, my next project will be on relationship/friendship/connection strength on Twitter. My impression is that the strength of the ‘relationships’ (for want of a better word) forged on Twitter... 

What a great night we all had at Ignite Boulder! The presenters were all wonderful, well prepared and community vibe was enormous. The ATLAS theatre was packed – you can definitely see why these were some of the hottest tickets in town leading up to the event. This community is incredible. I’m so grateful to have been welcomed into it. It’s so kind of Glenn Letham to have filmed... 

I’m really excited to be presenting this coming Wednesday evening at the third Ignite Boulder, being held at the ATLAS building at CU. Tickets to the event sold out in just 7 hours. (When I say ‘sold out’ I mean they were taken… the tickets are actually free.) That’s scary fast. Ignite is a fantastic event in which speakers have just 5 minutes and 20 slides to present... 

Traditional print media’s attempts to embrace an online presence has been lacklustre, and in fact has helped kill their brands. Most print MSM have incorporated blogs as part of their delivery mechanism. They have made their existing, print-trained reporters produce content for a medium they are not familiar with. It’s like having a trained print journalist produce television. There are... 

This week we went indoor rock climbing with a friend of mine who took time out to show us how it’s done (thanks!). While I stupidly forgot about my fear of heights (remembered when I looked down from about 8 feet up), and Charlie decided it hurt his hands and feet too much at just one foot up, Harry proved once again that he’ll give almost anything a go. Here he is having a go at the 30... 

Recently many Twitterers (and their associates) contributed to my survey on American women’s attitudes to breastfeeding and its representation in the media. I promised to share the outcomes of my research and the survey, which this post seeks to do. For those interested, the entire paper (30 pages plus 15 page complete survey result appendix) is available by emailing me or asking on Twitter... 

Yesterday we took a road trip to Vail. It’s just two hours away. I found a great sledding area in Vail courtesy of a website which lets you locate good sledding runs (free) in your neighbourhood. We entered the address in the GPS, and off we went! The day cost us nothing apart from the car’s petrol and wonderful pizza we ate for dinner. We’ve discovered the following: a. I need... 

Harry loves to hike through the Rocky Mountains. There are more trails around here than you can poke a … hiking staff at. (Sorry.) Harry’s decided to do a series of Hiking with Harry videos, which will show everyone a little bit of what new things he’s experiencing in hiking in a completely different environment. This is his first one, where he is seeing his first ever frozen lake.... 

Following my previous post about unhappily swimming in the B Pool, I’m pleased to have been able to scramble my way through to a bit of a splash in the A pool. You know, that place where the cool kids are?   My final paper for Media Ethics,  Twittering a Funeral: Social media’s challenge to professional journalism received a final A grade. I think my professor was just as relieved and... 

Colorado is not just about snow (the lack of which in 2008 is duly noted). Colorado has some absolutely incredible dinosaur excavations, including stuff that’s still being dug up to this day. That’s something I didn’t know until we went on a day-long excursion/adventure this week. First stop was one of the sites about half an hour from where we are living, at Dinosaur Ridge. The... 

During my final 12 months in Australia, a disturbing language fad happened in the youth I was teaching at college. It was also demonstrated across all youth, because I saw it in my own children. The use of the word gay to describe something negative. Anything negative. Was gay. “That’s so gay.” “He’s so gay.” “That game’s gay.” The real meaning... 

Being true blue surf, sand and sea Aussies who have lived on the Eastern coast of Australia forever, our kids have never seen snow. Australia definitely has it though. But it’s about a 5 hour drive to the ski fields from where we lived, and the price to stay, ski or whatever was incredibly prohibitive, especially given we’re a large family. And the snowy mountains only has snow for about... 

Moving online has caused Mainstream Media (MSM) quite a few headaches. I explored this a little during my Pubcamp presentation earlier this year. Unlike many, I believe there is still life in MSM yet - they just have to learn to adapt to the new environment and, staying true to their code of ethics, make the most of new media in a way which better serves the audience. Too many MSM consider they...